


The Highlands

by who_won_the_race_back_home



Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Gen, One Shot, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-31
Updated: 2014-07-31
Packaged: 2018-02-11 04:24:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2053482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/who_won_the_race_back_home/pseuds/who_won_the_race_back_home
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How Tony got his ridiculous silver tooth.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Highlands

He and Sammy drove up 65 on the way back to Cincinnati from Montgomery. They did a favor for a guy Sam owed one to, and all Tony knew was they had to take some coke from a dude in Mobile and bring them to another dude in Montgomery. It wasn’t their normal job, but Sammy was a man of his word, and Tony wasn’t really one to ask questions when ten thousand in cash was being put into his hand.

They could’ve been home in less than half a day, but decided to take their time heading back. The money was burning in their pockets and neither of them had anywhere to be for a good while. Sammy had a buddy from his pre-Army days that lived in Louisville, and the guy was nice enough to invite them to crash at his place for a night if they ever happened to be in town. The promise of a good whiskey or two and some decent company aside from one another was an enticing enough offer.

Sammy drove. Tony took care of fiddling with the radio, settling on a station playing old honky tonk. It was a little faint, but better than the alternatives. They never talked much during these long drives; they didn’t really need to. Hank Williams’ “Lovesick Blues” came on just as they pulled off the highway and into the city proper. Sammy mumbled the words to himself and squinted through the window looking at street signs.

“I can pull out my phone and look it up,” Tony said, knowing they could be driving around for hours.

“Man, fuck off, I know where I’m going. It’s right down the street from this weird pizza place. Just gotta find that.”

Tony chuckled to himself and let it go, and looked at the gorgeous old houses they were passing by. They’d been in town for less than ten minutes and he could already see himself living there, sitting on a nice little porch, bourbon in hand. Rent was probably as cheap as Cincinnati, he could do some handyman work for money, start caring about college basketball or something; it seemed every other house had a University of Louisville flag out front. Then again, whenever he and Sammy got paid he started thinking about this sort of shit, finding somewhere quieter and slower to live, getting a dog, maybe settling down with someone who had that same love of good booze.

“Told you I don’t need a fucking GPS,” Sammy said to himself, snapping Tony out of his haze.

They pulled into the driveway of a skinny, two story house that was painted an unfortunate shade of pale green. A scrappy looking dog laying on the grass gave them a glance, but was otherwise unfazed. The front door opened and a burly (definitely bigger than Sammy, so probably close to a foot taller than he was) black man with a bushy beard and a Carolina Panthers t-shirt stepped out with a wave. The dog perked up at its owner’s friendliness and raced over to the two of them. Sammy crouched down to start wrestling with it.

“Oh yeah, nice to see you too, Sam,” the guy shouted.

Sammy picked himself off the ground, but continued playfully batting his hands in the dog’s direction. “Just practicing good manners. It would be impolite not to say hi to the missus first. Ain’t that right, Lexy?”

He patted her head a couple more times and went over to give his friend a hug, then called Tony over.

“Mike, Tony. Tony, Mike.” Tony stuck his hand out to shake, but Mike pulled him in for a quick back pat. “Any friend of Sam’s,” he said. “Nice to meet you. You been keeping this idiot out of trouble all right?”

“More like the other way around.” Tony motioned to himself, “He’s saved my scrawny ass from getting completely kicked a couple of times.”

“Man, you are one Canadian motherfucker,” Mike said, chuckling. “How the hell they even let you in here?”

“North Dakota has thin border patrol around January.”

Mike slapped his back again. “He’s alright, Sam.”

He pulled out a phone from his pocket and checked the time. “It’s damn near four thirty, and I doubt either of you have had a drink today, so lets fix that, and I can get to telling Tony all about how big a dumb ass you used to be.”

Tony laughed, “What do you mean used to be?”

Sam hung his head, but laughed anyway, and Mike led them inside.

* * *

 He was so moving to Louisville. The three of them were all a couple (or four) glasses of Buffalo Trace in when Mike decided to take them on a tour of the town, which meant the weird pizza place down the street and the bar around the corner. The pizza was decent enough, and the place was only weird by having some hippy mural painted on their storefront, but the bar, Freddie’s, was his kind of place. Aside from being a total dive, a neon sign out front advertised “Beer To-Go” and the jukebox started playing “Smokestack Lightnin’” when they walked in. Hell, he’d move in right here if they’d let him.

Tony found a seat at the bar while Sam and Mike took over the pool table to settle some nearly decade old score. He laughed to himself while they bickered about who was going to break.

“You a friend of Mike’s?” the woman next to him asked.

“The bald guy, we work together,” he said, pointing at Sammy. “Mike’s an old buddy of his, we just met.”

“I figured y’all weren’t from here. Not too often we get new faces. What do you and your friend do?” 

Tony turned to her, mostly to be polite, but also just in case she was trying to do something more than just make friendly small talk. It was hard to tell with folks from the south.

“We frame houses in Cincinnati, do a lot of odd jobs for contractors, working on kitchen remodels, stuff like that.” He stuck his hand out to shake, “I’m Tony.”

Her grip was firm, and she smiled, “Julia. It’s nice to meet you, Tony.”

“Same here,” he said. “Can I get you a beer?”

While Sammy and Mike spent the better part of the evening fighting over house rules and conveniently forgetting terms of bets made years ago, Tony talked to Julia about Springsteen, bourbon, and growing up in shitty small towns. Maybe he fell in love a little bit, but it seemed like an easy thing to do in this city.

* * *

 Right around last call a guy came in who was pretty wasted. He reminded Tony of the white trash hustlers back in Cincinnati: baggy jeans and a cheap ribbed tank top, with a silver cross on his neck that bordered on excessive. He wasn’t stumble down drunk, but it was clear he had had about three too many. Julia sighed heavily, shaking her head and turning away from the door, looking like she didn’t want to be seen.

“That’s an ex of mine. He does dumb shit when he’s this drunk. I’m really sorry.”

Before he had a chance to reply he was getting pulled off his bar stool by the collar of his shirt. This guy was definitely going to do something stupid.

“Back the fuck off of her,” he spit into Tony’s face. He reeked of cheap booze.

“Nice to meet you too, buddy,” Tony said, taking a step back. “As great as I think the conversation with you would be, it doesn’t look like she wants to talk to you. Just go home, man. Don’t be dumb.”

“Get out, Jack. I swear to god, I’m going to call the cops this time,” Julia said.

“Shut the fuck up, Jules. Why you talking to this little fucking punk?” He softened in an instant like only a drunk could. “C’mon, babe. Fuck him. Let’s go.”

She clenched her fists and breathed heavily for a moment, but then pushed past the both of them and towards the door. “Tony, I’m sorry.” She turned to her drunken ex, “Jack, go home. Please.” And she left.

Jack watched her walk out, then whipped around to shove Tony hard. “You fucker,” he said.

Tony stumbled, but found his footing and stepped towards Jack, taking a swing at his nose, but he was pretty nimble for a staggering drunk. Tony only managed to graze his ear, but it still sent Jack into a rage. He hit fast, and jabbed Tony square in the teeth. As he fell back toward the floor, he grabbed at the asshole’s shirt, trying to take him down, but only managed to break his necklace off. By the time he was on the ground, Sammy had twisted Jack’s arm behind his back and was shoving him hard toward the door. Mike was by his side and offered him a hand up.

“Shit, you alright?” he asked. Tony spit and felt around with his tongue. A tooth that had been giving him trouble for months was definitely gone. It sat shining, split in two, in the puddle of blood near his feet. “I wished I had gone a little longer without getting punched in the face again, but at least this time I got the guy’s power of the lord,” he said, showing Mike the broken cross necklace. Mike laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. He led Tony and his trophy out of the bar with a promise to pay his tab next time. Sammy was up against the wall nursing his left hand.

“He gonna bother her?” Tony asked.

“Don’t think so,” Sammy said.

“Good.” He turned to Mike, “Told you he kept me outta trouble.”

* * *

The next afternoon he and Sammy set off back to Ohio with a couple fifths of Kentucky’s finest and a goodbye lick from Lexy. His first stop back home was to a friend of a friend, this guy who was a clinic dentist in Appalachia years ago. He hadn’t had a license in years, but a few hundred bucks refreshed his memory pretty well. Tony wanted to melt the necklace down and stick right in his mouth, because he couldn’t think of a bigger fuck you, but apparently cheap silver plated jewelry didn’t really work for that. But his guy knew another guy who could get a silver tooth. and no one would be the wiser. It probably wouldn’t stay in for more than a couple years, but by then maybe he could afford a real dentist, and in the meantime he would have a hell of a story. He called it his conversation piece. Sammy said it made him look like a fucking scumbag, which only made him smile.

A week later while they were driving back from another job he got a text from a number with a Louisville area code.

_Hope you don’t mind Mike giving me your number. ;)_

"Conversation fucking starter, man," he said, punching Sammy in the shoulder.

Sammy called him a moron, and they drove back to Cincinnati listening to Tom Petty and bullshitting.

 


End file.
